Snow fell silently over the capital, each white flake dissolving the scent of blood and smoke that clung to the night. The grand Zhao residence—once a symbol of loyalty and honor—now stood shrouded in darkness, its lanterns extinguished like the lives within.
She knelt in the courtyard, thin robes soaked through by melting snow, fingers numb as they pressed into the frozen stone. Around her lay the bodies of those who had once smiled at her, taught her, or simply existed under the same roof. Servants. Guards. Family. None were spared.
Above the courtyard steps, imperial soldiers stood with cold, indifferent eyes.
"You are the last," one of them said flatly. "Zhao Yaoqin, daughter of the traitor-general."
She wanted to laugh. Traitor? Her father had defended the borders for decades, bled for the empire, lost brothers and comrades in the name of the throne. Yet a single decree had turned hero into criminal, loyalty into treason.
Yaoqin lifted her head. Her face was pale, her lips cracked, but her eyes—those eyes—burned with quiet fury.
"I am not a traitor's daughter," she said hoarsely. "History will remember the truth."
The soldier hesitated only a moment before raising his sword.
Steel flashed.
Pain never came.
Instead, darkness swallowed her whole.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
The sound echoed faintly, rhythmic and distant, as though calling her back from an endless void.
Yaoqin gasped.
Her eyes flew open, breath tearing into her lungs as if she had been drowning. The scent of blood was gone, replaced by something unfamiliar—burning incense and aged wood. She lay on a narrow bed, wrapped in coarse blankets, her body weak but unmistakably alive.
Alive?
Her heart thundered violently as fragments of memory collided in her mind. Execution. Snow. The sword.
She sat up abruptly—and froze.
The room was small and bare, clearly belonging to a servant's quarters. Her hands were thinner than she remembered, her skin smoother, unmarked by years of hardship. When she stumbled toward a cracked bronze mirror, the reflection staring back at her stole her breath.
A young girl. Barely fifteen. Pale, delicate, with calm black eyes far too knowing for her age.
This was her face.
No—this was her old face.
Before betrayal. Before the massacre.
Before everything fell apart.
A sharp ache bloomed in her chest, quickly followed by a dangerous clarity. Heaven had not shown her mercy out of kindness. It had returned her to the beginning—to the years when she had been invisible, ignored, and forgotten within the general's household.
Yaoqin slowly clenched her fists.
"If fate has given me another life," she whispered into the silence, "then this time… I will not be a forgotten daughter."
Outside, the first bell of dawn rang across the capital.
And destiny began to turn.